


That Goddamn Sweater

by oatmealcrisp



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, idk what else, jack wasnt in a good place for a lot of his existence but jamie helps, mood whiplash and weird tenses abound
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-13
Updated: 2015-05-13
Packaged: 2018-03-30 10:56:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3934198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oatmealcrisp/pseuds/oatmealcrisp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jamie has never seen Jack take off his sweater. One night he learns why, and a little something more.<br/>(Or these boys are awk as hell and everyone leaves unrealistically happy)</p>
            </blockquote>





	That Goddamn Sweater

**Author's Note:**

> So first off TW for self harm. Second i started off wanting to write angst then switched to happy really weirdly so heads up for that. Also weird tenses idkwtf i was thinking.
> 
> Also ive kinda sorta been where jack has so puckered pink scars are reffed from my own.

He's seen glimpses before.

Flashes, really, of pale skin. Generally it happens after something Big which Jamie has somehow managed to insert himself into, some doomsday-preventing battle that leaves the Guardians scraped and battered. Jack's hoodie, falling apart as is with elbows worn through and cuffs frayed, will have torn somewhere and through it Jamie will catch a sliver of flesh.

By the next time they meet, the hoodie will have been mended. Jamie keeps himself up at night sometimes, caught up in guilty fantasies detailing what the rest of it might look like.

It takes him years to realize it, but Jack never takes that hoodie off. The pants Jamie can understand, but Jack will visit during the depths of summer. The spirit of winter isn't overly vulnerable to the muggy heat but he'll react as any other human would, puffing and sweating through it and drinking copious amounts of water to replace lost fluids.

Jack grins through it, as obviously pleased to be around his First Believer (Jamie always hears it in a way that bestows upon it capital letters and as he's grown older it's made him blush) as Jamie is to be around Jack, but Jack doesn't so much as roll up his sleeves.

Jamie doesn't get concerned. Curious yes, and when he asks one day (99F, they've been playing video games in Jamie's room and drowning themselves in the pink lemonade his mother made earlier that week) Jack laughs it off.

Jamie laughs it off with him.

He'll kick himself for it for years.

Because now he's standing in his bathroom, the linoleum cold under his feet, with his heart pooling steadily into his stomach. His arms are numb, holding clothes to replace the ones Jack has dirtied in his latest scuffle and Jack is in front of him, pale as the moon in the midst of the fog from the shower, his eyes alight with something not altogether happy.

Jamie isn't looking at Jack's eyes however. At this moment his gaze is searching the others arms, his ribs and his torso, his thighs, and all the scars which cover them.

His mouth is dry so he licks his lips and gradually brings his eyes to his friend's (and yes, his crushes). Theres something like panic and guilt before the blue eyes turn away and that tells Jamie all he needs to know.

If these were wounds sustained in battle Jack would be boasting and spinning war stories, basking in the attention and laughing, smiling, not...

Not looking as though he'd been caught with his hand in the cookie jar, so to speak.

"Jack?" Jamie croaks because there's not much else he can do and the spirit in front of him takes in a breath like he's forgotten what his lungs are for, eyes hiding in the shadows of his hair.

The brunet watches as Jack's lips twist and press, searching for words to say before finally settling on a grim line.

"Get out. Jamie. I need...we'll talk once I've had my shower." The spirit finishes pulling off the hoodie that'll need to be mended again, drops it onto the floor.

Jamie gets out, and takes a seat in the livingroom. He's 28 now, 30 looming ever closer on the horizon, so he's got this apartment all to himself. After a moment he rises from the couch and grabs a beer from the fridge, seeking to fortify himself. It tastes disgusting and with piss on his tongue, he thinks.

He's seen scars like that before. Through his work as an officer, he's met all sorts of people and the mentally ill and disenfranchised are only some of them. There's no beating around the bush, he thinks. Those are self inflicted.

Well, surely not all of them he amends. His friend spends his life jumping from one battle to the next, much like Jamie and his paycheques. But his mind flashes to the puckered pink lines, the barely there snatches of silver, and he drops his head with a thick sigh.

The empty bottle of Milwaukee hits the coffee table. The shower turns off.

For a few minutes there's not much more but tense silence until he hears the soft padding of Jack's no doubt bare feet. The other approaches steadily until Jamie can feel the white haired spirit just behind the couch over his shoulder.

"...Thanks for the clothes." Jack broaches, tentative in a way that Jack shouldn't be.

Jamie doesn't bother not to be blunt. "What the hell, Jack?"

The brunet spreads his hands, clammy from stress and the cold bottle both, and lifts his head to give the eternal youth a look of-of something.

Jack's face could rival the hardness of steel, low light only throwing the boyishly pretty features into sharp relief. He's silent, so Jamie takes that as permission to continue.

"What the fuck? I mean-what the fuck were you thinking? Are those-I swear to God they better not be what I'm thinking they are-"

Jack's features warp into something approaching a grin and he turns to seat himself in the chair next to the couch. Jamie thinks for a second that his clothes really are too big for the other's small frame.

"Judging by your reaction, I'd say they're exactly what you think they are." There's an almost-humour in the others voice as he rolls up his sleeve and admires the inside of his wrist.

"You know, next time I'd appreciate it if you'd knock."

Jamie can't take this. He explodes from his seat, swiping the empty bottle into the wall where it crashes and breaks. 

"This isn't funny, Jack!" He finds himself surging forward and grabbing the others wrists, giving them a shake. Jack is muscled (the benefits of constant exertion and just enough food to get by, he'd once confided) but Jamie's hands still easily envelope the others arms.

Jack is wincing, small and precious in the overstuffed secondhand chair and Jamie clutches him harder, words beyond him in his-

What is this, panic? Incredulity? Rage? He's not altogether too sure, his emotions are a muddy mix buzzing underneath his skin and setting his teeth to clench hard enough to make his jaw ache and pulse to the tune of his heart.

This is Jack. Jack, who's close to him, who's strong and proud and invincible and so so powerful. He looks at the spirit with wide eyes, seeking denial, and finds distant eyes and a grim youthful face.

"I know, Jamie." Jack sighs in the voice that used to sing him to sleep and now goads him on his dreams. "I know this isn't funny. Jamie..."

Jack drops his head, seeming to deflate all at once with a sigh. His knees are curled up against his chest, a familiar pose. Jamie drops to his knees, silent and wide eyed.

"I know I haven't told you all that much, and looking back on it its fuzzy and distant because-because I have you now, and the others, and the Guardians. Jamie..."

Jack looks up at him and Jamie's breath catches with the force of the emotion in his favoured blue gaze. 

"It sounds...it sounds stupid but being invisible for 300 years to humans and run off or ignored by everyone else, it...didn't do good things to me." Lips twisted into a thin line, Jack averts his eyes again, expression dim as he looks back on it. "I don't like to talk about it...I swung a lot, between rage and-and something else. And I didn't do good things, to both myself and others."

Jamie supposes, looking at his friend now, that perhaps he's held Jack on something of a pedestal. He sits back on his legs and releases Jack's wrists in favour of his hands, long and slender, and listens.

"It's not something I'm proud of. I hurt a lot of people Jamie. I guess...I guess I thought that I'd...well I don't know what I thought but it wasn't good." Jack is silent, turns his eyes to look at their hands and gently squeezes Jamie's as if he can't believe the other is still there.

This happens sometimes. Jack will pause and look at him just like this, with fondness and amazement as if he can't believe Jamie is with him. There has always been something sad in that look, but Jamie hasn't really ever understood it.

"And then I'd...go to another place, and I'd hurt myself. It was the only way I could really convince myself I was alive, that I wasn't just some corpse at the bottom of a lake. There were good periods too!"

Jack looks up, awkward and hasty, and Jamie supposes his expression is a sorrowful one because Jack pastes a painfully false smile on, one that's too many teeth and too big eyes.

"Sometimes I could find enough joy in giving it to other people to keep me going. I guess-I guess that was my center getting me through it because I'd give kids snow and watch them play and be happy and that-that'd be enough. Almost enough." Jack's eyes go distant for a second before he comes back to the present and continues. "And then I met the Guardians, and you, and it's all better now!"

Jamie...finds this hard to believe because it hasn't even been fifty years for Jack and 300 years of pain and misery can't be erased in so short a time.

His heart feels bruised and battered in his chest and he looks away, needing to get his bearings. His thumbs run over Jack's knuckles, scarred by breaking too many noses, and he takes a deep breath. He feels like a piece of shit, low and small, because he's never thought of this before. Jack has told him that he was alone before he met them, but Jamie had taken the others grinning for granted and hadn't wondered about how that must have felt.

He's an idiot, is what he is.

Jack is rambling assurances and he looks up at the spirit, seeing for the first time a desperate happiness burning in the other's eyes, the product of spending too long in the deep-end without respite and upon finding the air, clinging to it with both hands for the terror of losing it again.

"Jack." He cuts the man off (because he may have the face of a boy but he's well over Jamie's age), prompting the others silence and questioning look. "Do you still...I need to know if you still hurt yourself."

The pale look and awkward nothingness are all the answer Jamie needs and the brunet expels a harsh breath, head falling to rest upon Jack's legs. He grits his teeth and scrunches his eyes furiously closed, trying his hardest not to cry.

"J-Jamie..." Jack whispers and drops his legs, allowing the man's forehead purchase against his knees, and lets go of a hand to rest hesitant fingers on his head.

Jamie wants to lash out with his teeth and hold Jack close at the same time because how can he do this? HOW?

"It-it's not bad, I just...sometimes I can't help...it..."

Jamie sucks in a wet breath and looks up with a glare. "Well you'd better start fucking helping it because you're not allowed to do that shit ever afuckingain you hear me? This has to stop, Jack!"

Jack looks stunned and resigned at once and he has experience with that look, knows that it's both asking why he cares and is full of the knowledge that it won't stop anytime soon.

The next second Jamie has Jack cradled tightly in his arms, his face buried in the sopping wet mess of the others hair as he takes a seat upon the chair. Jack grunts in shock and flails, hands finding purchase in his clothes.  
Its still for some time after that, Jack too awkward to speak and Jamie too busy reassuring himself with the sensation of Jack's expanding ribcage, drumming heart, and the smell of his own shampoo in the others drying hair.

"If you ever," He speaks eventually, voice low to disguise the shaking that's sure to be there. "feel that urge again, I want you to come to me okay?"

"...Okay."

He relaxes his grip gradually but keeps his face in the spirits hair, only lifting it when a thought strikes him.

"Do the others know?" He asks, finding Jack's eyes with his own.

Jack, looking entirely too unsure of himself, licks his bottom lip and shrugs.

"I...think Bunny suspects but I haven't told anyone."

Jamie isn't sure if he should feel horrified or relieved that he's not the only one ignorant of Jack's plight, settles for leaning back in the chair and focusing on his breathing.

He's aware for a little while of Jack's fidgeting in his lap, plucking at the sleeves of his borrowed hoodie and the hems of likewise borrowed sweats. Both are too long and too big and normally Jamie would get a lusty sort of amusement out of the sight but he's too exhausted at the moment.

It likewise probably wouldn't be very appropriate, given the situation.

Jamie is reminded that Jack isn't overly concerned about appropriateness or anything like it when, about five minutes later, he pipes up.

"So, uh, I guess now wouldn't be a good time to confess that I've kindasortabeencrushingonyou for the past ten years and this is starting to get reeeaally awkward for me, you holding me in your lap and all." Jack meets his stunned gaze with a tight smile. "So, uh, now that you're probably disgusted by me, mind letting me go?"

Jamie finds he can only blink at Jack. Seconds tick by and the other shifts a bit, dropping his eyes and forcing a chuckle.

"Disgusted outburst is taking a little longer than I expected it to." He quips, waking Jamie up to reality. "You uhm, you alright in there Jamie? James? Kiddo?"

"I'm not!" Jamie yells, startling them both and prompting a deep blush to take residence on the brunet's cheeks.

Jack's quizzical stare reminds him he should probably elucidate.

"Disgusted! I mean! I'm not...I'm not disgusted at you. Jack..."

This is too much for him and he thinks all the mood whiplash might be giving him a headache.

He pins the smaller man with a look that must be as sad and sappy as he feels right now because Jack grows still.

"Jack, you are...the last thing that would ever disgust me, you..."

He thinks the look in the others white-flecked blue eyes could be described as 'tentative hope' and it encourages him to continue.

"I've been...feeling much the same way." Jamie's eyes drift shyly to the side before he can stop himself, and he chews on the inside of his cheek. "For...a few years, really. I'm sorry for not...telling you sooner."

"...You're serious." Jack mutters and Jamie nods.

And then Jack is laughing, a little awkwardly but a sound thats full of emotion of the 'I can't believe this is happening' variety and Jamie is soon in joining even though todays little revelations aren't really laughing material so he feels kinda shitty about it but letting go of the angst just feels so good.

And then it's even better because now they're kissing and Jamie has some experience in this field but Jack clearly doesn't and so giggling the both of them, he guides the other along. Jack, he discovers with delight, is an enthusiastic learner and pretty shortly they're surrounded by each other in a mess of limbs. Jamie can smell his body wash on the other and it makes that bad possessive part of himself growl with fulfillment.

Yep. Too much, too fast. They part and Jamie can see that Jack's a little breathless, still within kissing distance, and they look at each other.

"Well." Jamie breathes, giving Jack's ribs a pat with each hand. "I think thats enough with the thinking and emotions today. What do you say to pizza and a movie with big explosions and ridiculous gunfights?"

Jack blinks and grins with a soft laugh. Its probably the most beautiful thing Jamie's ever seen.

"I think that sounds really, really good. Also, aspirin. I've got a ridiculous headache."

"You're telling me." Jamie returns the grin and they sit there, counting the minutes to the tune of each others breaths before Jack blinks and flushes.

"Right. I'll pick out the movie, then." The white haired man mumbles and climbs from Jamie's lap, causing the brunet to blink.

"Oh. Oh! Right, yeah, uh, pepperoni?" He asks, rising to find the phonebook.

"You're damn right. And don't forget the extra cheese!"

"Demandng demanding..."

The rest of the night isn't very long. They both fall asleep with a quarter of the movie left to go, snuggled up against each other with the pizza cooling on the table. Jamie awakens sometime around three in the morning to an aching back and a snoring Jack against his chest. Gathering the latter he stumbles his way through the dark into the bedroom, grumbling over Jack's ridiculous weight (for a guy that can be carried by the wind light as a snowflake he's damn heavy) before flopping into bed.

Theres swearing and grumbling when Jack wakes up and they reposition themselves tiredly, bitching at each other with long-bred familiarity before settling down chest to chest.

As Jack's breathing evens out once more, Jamie thinks to himself muzzily hat he will make damn sure that everything will turn out okay.

It's a promise.


End file.
